Cicero: “And this is the highest statesmanship and the soundest wisdom on the part of a good citizen, not to divide the interests…”

The first office of justice is to keep one man from doing harm to another, unless provoked by wrong; and the next is to lead men to use common possessions for the common interests, private property for their own.

Further than this, who fails to see that those promises are not binding which are extorted by intimidation or which we make when misled by false pretences?

But for the most part, people are led to wrong-doing in order to secure some personal end; in this vice, avarice is generally the controlling motive.

But while they steer clear of the one kind of injustice, they fall into the other: they are traitors to social life, for they contribute to it none of their interest, none of their effort, none of their means.